


Changes

by sunshineandguns



Category: Xena: Warrior Princess
Genre: F/F, Gabrielle character exploration piece, Light Angst, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Vignettes, gabrielle the bard, set across a number of seasons, vulnerable Xena
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2020-11-07
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:33:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27436645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunshineandguns/pseuds/sunshineandguns
Summary: Gabrielle & Xena change through the years. (Set across seasons 1, 2, 5 and 6(ish).
Relationships: Gabrielle/Xena
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28
Collections: Femslash Exchange 2020





	Changes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wonderluck](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wonderluck/gifts).



> Well, this is my first writing for this pairing/fandom, my first fic exchange, and my first time posting under this username. A lot of firsts.
> 
> I want to thank my fiancée for beta checking this and allowing me to prod at her 19 years of Xena knowledge extensively. Thank you also to Mac who will probably never read this but who encouraged me to join in with this exchange.
> 
> Wonderluck, who this fic was written for... I hope you enjoy this story. I hope it ticks enough boxes, and that you have a wonderful holiday season. Thank you.

I.

“All I’m saying is, I don’t understand how it’s fair that you should always get to have the horse, and I should always be forced to walk.”

“You and Argo don’t exactly have the best relationship. Besides, she’s _my_ horse. You chose to—“

Gabrielle rolled her eyes, stabbing at the sandy ground beneath her feet with the end of her staff, “I chose to tag along with you... you know, Xena, I’ve had a birthday since we met - you might think to change your argument somewhere along the line.”

“I’ll change mine when you change yours,” and even without looking at Xena, Gabrielle could tell that she was distracted, the way her voice trailed off. She was doing what she always did: scanning the area for danger, listening for any minuscule variation in the sounds or smells of their surroundings. Gabrielle hated this. It would put her on edge, knowing that somebody was probably about to leap out of the bushes at them, and that she had about a virgins chance in Tartarus of being able to protect herself against whoever - or whatever - it was.

Oh, to have even a grain of Xena’s battle strength. It was no good though; Gabrielle had worked on her staff fighting non stop since they left the Amazons and she was still barely competent at it. She served a good distraction, occasionally getting a good hit in here and there, but she was far from being able to protect herself, much less Xena.

“Stay here,” Xena tells her, suddenly dismounting from Argo, and if Gabrielle hadn’t been sure there was danger somewhere nearby before, she was now.

“I’ll always just be the bard, won’t I Argo?” She said softly, hesitantly rubbing the horse’s face. Argo whinnied, shaking her head away from the touch, and causing Gabrielle to narrow her eyes. She’d always be the bard, and Argo and she would never get along. Some things would never change.

-

II.

It was hard to pinpoint the exact moment in which things changed. There was no sudden revelation; if anything, the feelings had thrum between the two of them from the moment they met, and it had been inevitable, really. Fate.

The final straw that broke the camel’s back, ironically - ludicrously, really - was Callisto. Or rather, Xena, being forced to manifest as the one person Gabrielle hated more than anything in the world. It had been such an impossible task, somehow making peace with the person she held dearest, wearing the face of her worst enemy, but... Gabrielle had somehow come out the other side of it unscathed. Xena, even with hair too light and eyes too dark, and a face that could turn even the deepest, most sincere sentiments into something twisted and snarling, was still Xena. Her soul looked the same, even if it was encased in darkness.

And it made sense, finally getting Xena back as herself - whole, and beautiful and with those piercing blue eyes which Gabrielle loved so much - that Gabrielle would feel the need to be closer, until no amount of physical closeness was enough.

She had kissed Xena because it had felt, with everything that she had, like the only appropriate thing to do.

The kissing, and what had followed afterwards, had unleashed this side of her that Gabrielle had only ever been allowed glimpses of; Xena, vulnerable and malleable, completely undone and entirely beautiful. Gabrielle had been unaware of the power that she was capable of, the reverse in their dynamics suddenly obvious once Xena was laid out entirely in front of her.

And change had been something Gabrielle had begun to be afraid of, but not now. The irony that this huge change in their relationship was born out of things finally going back to normal was not lost on the bard. She knew she would be able to write a library of great things - great things that she admittedly would not be able to share with anybody else - about this one moment alone. That if Xena weren’t already her muse, the soft gasps, the gathering of tears in her eyes, the way she bit out Gabrielle’s name like a prayer... it was enough to feed her writing soul for a lifetime or more.

Things changed after that night, but in many ways, they stayed the same.

III.

She used to have the hands of a bard; delicate, despite the work she did on the farm, and the only blemishes a small burn from when she was a child, attempting to help cook, barely there now, and the tell-tale hard lump on her forefinger that announced her as a writer. Now, her hands were hardened, calloused from battle. The rough rope handle of her staff stopped burning years before she dumped it, but her hands still held the memory. Though smaller than Xena’s, the fingers stubbier, they bore the same signs of war that a younger, less worldly Gabrielle had been awed by what feels like a lifetime ago.

Xena had once told her she had the hands of a sailor. Gabrielle - who had held the needle and thread in trembling fingers, but over time proven herself more than capable of sewing up wounds, whether Xena’s or her own - had scoffed. What did that even mean, anyway? But she’d twisted her mouth into a smirk and reminded the warrior princess what those same hands were capable of, and she’d never heard that particular dig again. Still, Gabrielle wondered, how much of her story had been etched into her skin back then; and how much of it was obvious now?

It had been... gods only knew how long since she last picked up a scroll. The truth was, she was frightened to begin again. Being a bard, writing and storytelling, it had been such a huge part of her identity for so long, it never felt like something she would lose. And yet... somewhere along the line, she had changed. Xena, she knew, had changed her.

“Go on,” Xena murmured in her direction, again, gesturing to the scroll open in Gabrielle’s lap, the quill left untouched.

Xena was different too; her body, all sharp angles and strong, lean muscle, was softer, rounded now with the unmissable weight of impending motherhood. 

After whetting the nib, Gabrielle took a deep breath, and tried to visualise the words she wanted on the page - an old trick she’d picked up from her friends at the academy. For all the good it did; she couldn’t visualise anything with tears in her eyes.

 _If I’m not a bard, then what am I? What is my purpose?_ Gabrielle dropped the quill, using every ounce of her will not to shake, not to let Xena see how much this was affecting her. Whether that was because she didn’t want to have another argument, or didn’t want to add to Xena’s burden, she couldn’t decide.

Not that it made much of a difference; Xena could see straight through her. She always could do that, even with so much else on her mind lately. Gabrielle relaxed into the arm that wrapped around her shoulders, the thumb rubbing patterns into her shoulder blade as if it were second nature.

She tilted her head a little to meet Xena’s eyes, “Have I really changed so much that such a crucial part of who I am... who I _was_ is lost to me now?”

Xena had always had a way of looking at her that felt like she was able to stare right into her soul, her eyes an endless ocean of blue that Gabrielle could - and had, on many occasions - lose herself in entirely. Oh, the prose she could have written about those eyes if she were so inclined to, if she didn’t know that it would horrify Xena should anybody come across the scrolls other than the two of them.

Even Xena wasn’t enough of a muse to get Gabrielle writing tonight, though.

“You haven’t lost it,” the warrior princess insists, “you’re just a little out of practise. Who could blame you - you haven’t exactly had much time for,” she gestured, “this.”

And if Gabrielle saw a hint of guilt drift across Xena’s face then she wasn’t about to mention it. They could talk themselves into circles when it came to where the fault lay in any of the events of the last few moon cycles - they had done it frequently enough - and at the end of it all, she would still be faced with a blank page, and probably more of a foul mood than writer’s block could ever give her. Instead, she allowed herself to move closer into Xena’s embrace, seeking the warmth and familiarity of her long-time companion’s body, even with its new changes. Xena hummed against her, the faintest echo of a melody, and ran her fingers through Gabrielle’s cropped hair - yet another change that they were both still getting used to.

It was difficult not to look back on the past and focus on how much easier everything had been then. If Gabrielle was honest, she knew that that was only true with the assistance of rose-coloured lenses, that if she were truly honest with herself, they’d been fighting the same battles for years. It was only a few days ago that she and Xena had fought yet again over how protective the warrior princess was of her, how tiring it was to constantly be proving herself. That was a quarrel the pair had been having for as long as Gabrielle could remember, and whilst they reached solutions every so often - especially now, after Ares had more than proven her point for her, and everything that had followed - but she was not naive enough to believe they wouldn’t fight about it again.

She wasn’t the same little girl who had followed blindly after Xena, longing for something more than Potidaea, that much was true, but she hadn’t been such a fragile thing back then, either. Sure, she was stronger - both physically and mentally - and that did seem to make all the difference, but change had always seemed a constant in their lives together, and her growth as a person was probably more notable than her change as a fighter.

“Tell me a story, instead?” Xena suggested, her voice low and close to Gabrielle’s ear, and that was something else that was different. Back when they had first met, Xena had loathed - or at least claimed to - Gabrielle’s performances. “Don’t think too hard. It’s only me.”

“Xena, I don’t think I can. It’s been such a long time—-“

“You can. I know you can.”

So, Gabrielle began to talk. She spoke of a young woman - barely older than a girl - starting a very long journey. Along the way, she was met with many obstacles - giants who needed to be slain, villages that had to be saved, and wrongs that had to be righted. She described the battles in some detail, enjoying every quirk of Xena’s lips, the way she was so clearly enthralled, giving Gabrielle her whole attention, even once she began to look tired. Somewhere along the line, they moved to their bed rolls, and Gabrielle continued to talk, tucked up against Xena’s back, an arm slung over the warrior’s waist, as she spoke of finding love in unusual places, and the joining together of souls.

She had no idea how long she continued for, the words spilling out of her in a way that they hadn’t in such a long, long time, but by the time she had finished speaking, Xena was fast asleep.

-

IV.

It felt like the end of everything, and yet very much like the beginning of something new. Gabrielle stepped out onto the boat, and though she was still filled with fear, she did not feel alone.

“Do I need to keep you away from raw fish?”

Gabrielle laughed, shaking her head at the memory. She was not yet entirely cured of her seasickness, but over the years they’d found ways around it. Ways that did not involve eating raw squid.

“I’m proud of you, you know.”

It was eerie, just how solid Xena appeared to her. If she hadn’t been there herself, hadn’t witnessed every moment of it with her own eyes, she might well have believed that nothing had changed.

“Xena, you needn’t be,” she murmured, aware that to anybody who might be looking on, she might as well have been speaking to herself.

The smile that greeted her was easy, familiar. Gabrielle knew she should feel a pang of pain at the sight of it, at the thought that all this might just be temporary, that maybe she was going slowly insane after all. She didn’t, though. It didn’t feel like such a huge change, after all.

If anything, Xena needing no encouragement to compliment her... now that was the real absurdity.

This would make one hell of a scroll.


End file.
